Finnair are branching out from the aviation industry to develop a new business vision for the future; promoting and selling authentic Nordic experiences to their visitors, and they're doing it all from scratch. We caught up with Kim Gustafsson, Program Manager of Destination Nordics at Finnair to find out more.

This new venture has evolved over the past year, based on travel trends such as the rising popularity of the Nordics and Finland, as well as a new generation of travel coming from the booming Asian market. One of the most significant and influential markets in the tourism industry today. As such, many DMOs and travel companies are reviewing how they can optimise this increasing surge in popularity, in order to provide these visitors with the best service and experience possible.

Finland is experiencing a significant rise in incoming tourism. As such it is taking full advantage of its strategic location as Helsinki is the central hub for travel between Asia and Europe. Recognising this opportunity, Finnair set about creating a brand new strategy with a mission centred around developing great experiences, and providing these experiences in the form of an easy to use and accessible digital service.

This was also inspired by a more recent initiative, Finnair Holidays. A concept for travellers from Finland, Sweden and Estonia to go abroad, which was effectively the springboard for Finnair to take the concept and adapt it to inbound tourism. In such a competitive market within the experience sector, Kim Gustafsson from Finnair talks about the key to their strategy and how they are able to achieve this.

The core of the strategy is experiences, and the key to making this whole initiative possible is digitalising the product to make it accessible to visitors. Finnair recognised that customers want to buy a digital service, therefore in addition to understanding the market and knowing what’s out there, it is essential to provide a digital service.

Finnair collaborates with various platforms and partners in order to make this possible, as well as continuous concept testing and product development.

Kristiina Kukkohovi, Head of Finnair Holidays, will be joining us at DTTT Global on Friday 30th November talking about what it's like to work with an agency and the benefits and challenges of doing so, as well as the importance of concept testing.

Discussion

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